the war on higher ed in Iowa continues; or, pray for us!
I work at a public university in Iowa. I would thus be under direct threat should any of these bills become law.
The bills, themselves, don't actually bother me very much. The bill to abolish tenure comes up pretty much every year. The state's business community is strongly opposed to it, and everyone saw what happened to the University of Wisconsin when that state weakened its tenure policies. So although I'm keeping an eye on it, I don't think it will become law.
Moreover, the proposed law that would prohibit non-disclosure agreements on research grants would get tossed by the courts almost immediately. It would violate HIPAA policies. The other bills would also run up against contradictory federal law, or even the Constitution itself.
What bothers me is the grotesque ignorance and vindictiveness that drives this effort. The state legislature here seems to think we're a bunch of liberal elitists who want to tear down western civilization. They genuinely don't know what we do, how research grants work, or what we provide to the state, if not the entire nation. I suppose this shouldn't surprise me, given the flagrant stupidity of our governor, who just lifted pretty much all COVID restrictions. (Two major highways - I-80 and I-35 - intersect in the middle of the state. A lot of shipping passes through the state. Think of all the truck drivers who will risk their lives just driving from point A to point B.)
I get really hacked off when a politician dismisses anything I say with "But you don't live in the real world." As if we professors don't put our pants on one leg at a time. We come from the same neighborhoods as anyone else. (My father worked in a dairy factory when I was born.) We work our asses off, just like everyone else. Yes, there's a specialized language that seeps into our daily conversation and we sometimes talk shop when in groups, just like everyone else. And yes, some of us are jerks. But you know what? That's equally true of police officers, dental hygienists, farmers, lawyers, sales representatives, auto mechanics, hair stylists, truck drivers, airline pilots, and anyone else in a field that requires training and dedication. But when it comes to academics, the rules just don't seem to apply in their eyes.
I honestly don't know what to do. I love my institution; my grandfather taught here, I did my undergrad here, and I've been here as faculty for more than 20 years. You know how they say New York is a great place to visit, but you'd never want to live there? Iowa City is a great place to live, but you'd never want to visit. But I am nevertheless feeling the urge to go somewhere else. Somewhere that values higher education.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeltnietzel/2021/02/11/want-a-state-legislature-that-likes-to-meddle-with-higher-education-move-to-iowa/?sh=946c1db5afd9
= new reply since forum marked as read
Just in case somebody thought I was being serious.
The anti-intellectualism runs deep in the good ole US of A.
